


Before it's too late

by Littlelily80



Category: MacGyver (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Comfort/Angst, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Hurt Angus Macgyver (Macgyver 2016), Hurt Riley Davis, Hurt/Comfort, Infiltration, Love/Hate, Protective Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016), Protective Riley Davis, Season/Series 04, Sick Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016), Undercover Missions, sick
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-24
Updated: 2020-12-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:40:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27702209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Littlelily80/pseuds/Littlelily80
Summary: When a old friend of Phoenix asks Riley for help, jeopardizing the friendship between her and Mac
Relationships: Riley Davis & Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016), Riley Davis/Angus MacGyver (MacGyver TV 2016)
Comments: 24
Kudos: 51





	1. Nightmares

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone,
> 
> This is a story that is particularly close to my heart for many reasons, I won't list them here but I hope you will have the pleasure to read it as I had the pleasure to write it.  
> Just to warn you, there's going to be some MacDesi but it's by no means a fanfic about this couple, I'm sorry I had to do it for more consistency for the rest.  
> I hope you won't hate me afterwards ! I forgot to warn you, some chapters may be shorter than others.

If Angus Macgyver had found himself deep in a dark prison as he had done before, he could have made himself a pair of glasses that would help him defy the darkness. But he was not inside a prison, he was at home right now. He knew his home on the tip of his fingers, but his big toe had just met the corner of the coffee table. He had just profaned a curse by holding his toe in both hands.

  
The blond boy had been awakened by a noise, his instinct had defied him to go and see what was happening, but when he walked towards the front door, the noise had stopped, replaced by someone crying.  
It was that with Riley in the house right now,

Desi had shared the blond boy's bedroom a few times but not this time, she had gone to join army comrades who had forced her to come and join her in one of those very select clubs in Los Angeles.

The room that had once been Bozer's room was now Riley's room, it had been occupied by Riley for more than 6 months.

  
He decided to turn on the lamp that was next to the couch that lit up the rest of the room. The remains of the cans that came from the Chinese delicatessen and the beer corpses that were lying on it.

The blond boy shook his head, he had to concentrate again on the noises which turned out to be crying.

  
He had to take a look to make sure the hacker was safe even though the situation seemed to be complicated between the two of them.

She had been safe since their return from Washington, D.C., and he had noticed a change in her behaviour. She seemed to be more distant with him and rarely shared their meal.

Mac walked back to the room, his toe was hurting, but it wasn't that bad compared to everything that had happened since they had met Codex.

At that moment, his attention was focused on the door to the front room, he was about to put his right hand on the doorknob but his heart was playing a tango that he could have done without.

He had to enter it as his instinct suggested, or else he had to stand in front of it and signify his presence.

His heart and his instincts were definitely in agreement, he had to enter it, it was not the only reason, he had to make sure that everything was going well for her.

It was Riley we were talking about, and despite everything that was going on between them, he cared about her more than ever.

Gently his hand was turning the handle, he made a quick motion and the door opened gently. Whatever the consequences of his gesture, the blond boy wanted to make sure she was okay.

"Riles ?" he whispered in the dark of the room.

His only light was that of the moon, which was really very high. Unfortunately Mac couldn't see much, he felt the calm returning to the room, Riley was sniffing discreetly in a tissue she had just taken.

She turned on the small bedside lamp on her bedside table, her phone was vibrating, he watched the number and name appear on the front of the phone. She decided to take it to turn it off completely.

He was seized when he saw Aubrey's name, he was one of Riley's last exes and Riley had broken up with her on that famous double date between him and Desi & Riley and Aubrey.

"What are you doing here Macgyver?" answered the angry voice of the young woman.

  
He knew he was not allowed to enter the territory the young woman occupied. He was aware of the monumental mistake he had just made.

"I was... I not sure..."

He didn't have time to finish his sentence, she got up from her bed and moved closer to it. He took a few minutes to look at her from head to toe.

Riley had a few tears in the corners of her eyes, her hair seemed to be tangled and saw him looking at her. She wiped away her tears with a single gesture with one of her hands.

She was wearing a T-shirt that was three times too big for her, which certainly belonged to Jack because it had the effigy of the Hard-Rock AC/DC group on it.

Mac hadn't seen it on him directly, but he knew that Jack had enjoyed some of the band's songs.

  
It wasn't the first time he had seen her wearing this outfit and she knew the effect it could have on him.

The noise was coming from your room so I went to see if it was okay, he answered clearly.

"You know that you don't even have permission to enter in my room Macgyver"

The blond boy felt a few drops on his back. It was the second time she called him by his last name, it sounded very strange coming from the young woman.

"If you're interested, I just had a nightmare but it's okay, you won't have to come next time to see if I'm okay, the best you can do is stay at the door when it happens again"

He lowered his head, what had he done to deserve all the coldness of the young woman when a few weeks ago everything seemed to be going well.

The blond boy decided to close the door of the young woman's room and took one last look at her. He deserved it and was aware that mistakes had been made.

Riley decided not to look at him when he closed the door on him. His heart had been broken into a thousand pieces again when she saw him take his girlfriend's hand and they had just come out of the senate right after the hearing for the file 47 .

She was voluntarily distancing herself from him. Her feelings for him were beginning to fade, but her heart wasn't listening to her as often as it should have been.

It was because of this all this coldness and anger towards Mac.

To be continued...


	2. Heal the Pain

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for the kudos and comments, you made my day !!  
> Please hope you enjoy this second chapter and ready for a rollercoaster

Let me tell you a secret  
Put it in your heart and keep it  
Something that I want you to know  
Do something for me  
Listen to my simple story  
And maybe we'll have something to show  
(George Michael - Heal the pain)

Bozer looked all around him, Riley was also in one of the brown chairs, her computer was open, she was fast asleep, he thought.

She hadn't even heard her come in. He hadn't dared to bother her because he knew that she had been having nightmares on a regular basis for some time.

In fact, the nightmares had always been present and had been getting worse since that famous moment when a missile could have sent them to the other side of the southern hemisphere.

The young woman had woken up when she felt that the missile was trying to put its vest on her.

"What time is it?" asked the hacker.  
She looked all around her, the war room was the place she used to go when she wasn't in her room at Mac's house.

With her eyes half open and her hair in a mess, she glanced at her phone and realized it was past her bedtime.  
" It's a little after 10 o'clock, do you want me to take you home?"

She was combing her hair with her hands, not wanting to scare her best friend, Riley straightened up, it was out of the question for her to go back home, Desi's presence made her want to run away from there.

" It's nice of you but Matty gave me a lot of work and I'd rather be here on the spot than going home."

Boze knew that she was lying to him, he saw her looking at his screen, this obsessive work was not in line with the Phoenix manager's work, he had not taken it into account and noticed the change in the young woman's behavior, she had become almost aloof with every member of the team without exception and even more so with Mac.

  
Perhaps it was a way to protect himself, he knew his secret and had kept it well until now.

The young Phoenix agent knew that she was not in her normal state and could not do much about it, so he decided to shoot a second card of his choice anyway.

" Why don't you come to the apartment for a few days? It would give you a chance to rest a little, don't you think?"  
" It's nice of you but I like to live at Mac's but at the moment I don't have too much time to go home to rest"  
" Aren't you afraid of suffering even more than you already do?" Said Bozer  
" What makes you say that I'm suffering?"  
" Your body is screaming it, your attitude towards it, it doesn't bother me any more than that, I know you need to get away from it all and I'm here if you need me but he's been talking to me about it lately"  
" What did Macgyver say to you?"  
" That you call him by his full last name, which is usually not very good and he thinks you are distant with him"  
She had gotten up from the chair with her hands on her hips.  
" What more does it take for him to leave me alone? It's written all over my forehead, right?"  
" No, but you two should have a talk, you should think about telling him one of these days? Shouldn't I?"  
" Why would I think that? So that he'll literally admit to me that he just considers me a friend and nothing else? That there's never going to be anything coming from him?"  
" You know as well as I do that Mac is not someone who reveals himself as easily as he seems"  
" Macgyver doesn't care what he wants for God's sake, did you know that he was still with her after all that happened?"  
So that's why she was constantly angry with him. A window of the internet explorer had just opened. It was a conversation with a real estate agent from an agency in the Santa Monica area.  
" Did you find what you were looking for?"  
" No not yet, listen, you have to not talk about it, I know it's hard to keep a secret but two is even harder but you have to promise me that you will"  
" Don't worry, I know how to keep a secret and Miss Davis' secrets will be well kept"  
" Maybe I need to move on, it's not good for me "  
She had a few tears in the corner of her eyes, Bozer understood that she didn't need to draw a picture.

  
" So what's good for you?"  
" I don't know, I think there's a curse to all this, maybe I need to get away from here?"  
" Are you really serious about this ?"  
" It's not the first time I've thought about it, Boze, but don't tell anybody "  
" Don't worry, your secrets will be safe with me "

  
Mac & Riley's best friend had just taken his jacket and put it on, and he took a few steps and left the door open to the war room. This discussion was still hot in his mind, Riley wanted to get away from there, was this really what she wanted?

  
He couldn't answer the question, but he had to be prepared for any eventuality coming from his best friend.

  
The young man decided to take the shortest route to her lab, she decided to leave the door open in case he came back to see her and tried to convince her to come to the apartment again.

  
The tears had been flowing ever since Bozer had left, she had to wipe them away before someone saw them and came to question her.  
The blond boy was still around, Riley shook her head and started rubbing her eyes, she wasn't inclined to want to move from there. The hacker had just rested her head on the armrest of the chair and had turned around to avoid facing the front door.

  
She closed her eyes for a few moments, sleep decided to invade her again without asking her permission.

  
Mac looked at the young woman who had been sharing his life for a little while as she walked out of the lab. He had waved his hand at her when he saw Bozer nearby, Bozer gnashed his teeth, the story with Desi had gone too far for him and Mac was messing things up with Riley.

  
" Boze, I thought you'd already left ?" he asked;  
The young Phoenix agent was turning around to face his best friend and Sparky, who was sitting up long as if he was being operated on.  
" I'm just picking up my backpack and off I go".  
" Is something wrong?"  
" No. Why ?"  
" Do I feel you sitting worried right now ?"  
" Just a little tired but I'm fine "  
" Don't worry, do you know if Riley is still here?"  
" Last time I saw her, she was in the war room if I'm not mistaken, why do you ask?"  
" Just to know, I'm worried about her, I haven't seen her for almost a week and she's avoiding me more and more, that's for sure."  
" One wonders why!" Bozer mumbled in his beard.

  
Mac seemed to have pretended not to hear her or didn't want to talk about it either.  
" See you tomorrow," he said to his best friend of more than 20 years.  
"See you tomorrow, Boze "

  
Boze left not without a last look at his best friend, his features were drawn and he too obviously didn't want to move from here. Mac decided to store the screwdriver in a box next to him and unplugged some of the wires that had been used to power Sparky to find out where the problem was coming from.

  
The keys to his 4x4 were in his back pocket, he had only one thought in mind and decided to take the plunge, there was only one way to find out, and that was to talk to him.  
To understand why she was as cold as an iceberg in Greenland could be.

  
The blond boy decided to go up the stairs four by four, the latter noticing Riley's presence in the war room as Boze had said a few moments earlier.

  
She was sleeping on one of the brown armchairs.  
" Riles? murmured the latter hoping not to provoke her anger a second time in the day that had started so well.

  
The blond boy got even closer to her, he noticed that the young woman's computer was blinking, the battery was almost dead.

  
He decided to turn it off so as not to damage the computer and looked at a page that had caught his attention.  
The young woman decided to wake up at that moment, it was only the second time of the day that he had gone too far according to her.  
" What are you doing here MACGYVER?"  
She got up and immediately closed her laptop.  
"Uh... (Sigh) I'm sorry, your computer ran out of battery power so I wanted to turn it off, I'm sorry because I shouldn't have"  
"Listen to me, mind your own business next time, understand?"  
He tried to find the technique that wouldn't keep him away for a few moments, we had to break it all down before it went any further.  
" Did I do something bad to you?"  
" No, nothing, why?"  
\- You've been walking away from me for some time, calling me by my full last name and you're hardly ever in the field with me anymore.  
He was getting closer to her, but Riley was backing away as he walked.  
" I still have a lot of work to do, it was Matty who asked me and why, I wouldn't be allowed to call you by your last name, would you prefer I call Angus? Is it much better that way?"  
He lowered his head and couldn't see how to relieve all this hatred poured out against him.  
" I'm sorry if I hurt you, I don't understand myself sometimes"  
He had turned to the other side, her tears were flowing, she was sure of it.  
" I'm sorry but I still have a lot of work ahead of me"  
The silence had just returned to the room, Mac had turned back to the young woman again, his eyes red but the tears were gone.  
" Don't worry, do you want me to wait for you "  
" That's okay, I'll just stay a little longer and finish what I have to do"  
" Don't you have something to tell me?"  
She could see that he was trying a second time but she had to get him out of there before she totally exploded. Leaning over the front of her backpack to get what she needed, he had fried her and she was conscious.  
" It's nothing! Don't worry about it, worry about your girlfriend, maybe it's better this way"

  
He felt her throat closing, conscious that she was hiding the truth from him a second time and putting even more distance between them than there already was.

  
To be continued...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Are you ready for the next chapter because it's going to go up even more between them ?


	3. I wonder why are you so hungry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When a old friend of Phoenix asks Riley for help, jeopardizing the friendship between her and Mac

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 3 online, don't be too mean to me, I had a hard time writing this one because I wanted to reach a certain point of no return between the two of them.  
> I know you don't like to see them fight and neither do I, but I promise you that the rest will bring them back together because they are meant to be together.  
> I also know that the chapters are short sometimes and this is the case with this one, there are some small typos but don't blame me, I don't have a beta to help me correct those few mistakes.  
> If you left a kudos just before, you can leave a comment, it makes me very happy and it motivates me for the future.  
> I'm a MacRiley shipper and I promise you that I still am.

He felt her throat tighten, aware that this was the second time in 6 years that she was lying to him.  
Riley had managed to put some distance between her and the blond boy.

Something made Mac think that Desi was part of the story and that was what was bothering Riley the most.

Mac didn't want the young woman to get any further away from him than she already was.

" I'd like to understand one thing? Why is this anger directed at me in particular? What have I done to you?"

He looked at her, the young woman wouldn't answer him.  
" You avoid being in the same room as me and when you are, it bothers you a lot. But the worst part of it is that you avoid going on missions, pretending they are too dangerous, even though you loved it, at least that's what I thought? You'd rather stay here in Phoenix with Matty than be with me"

She was ducking her head, Mac had grasped the importance of her reasoning. She was walking away from him without knowing it.  
" I thought you liked it ?"

She glanced at him, he really wasn't in his normal state, his lips were pinched and his blue eyes seemed tinged with anger directed at her.

Riley had had it coming because she knew what it was going to cause. Mac's anger.

The blond boy was someone who rarely got angry, especially when it came to Riley.

" A while ago, you would have been in between telling me that we could talk about anything"  
" That was some time ago, Macgyver, it's changed, it's not just me who puts distance between us, do you realize that?"

She looked him straight in the eyes when she insisted on the last words, he looked away because he knew she was absolutely right.

" I know and I am well aware that you are not the only one who puts them. One thing I know for sure is that I haven't changed. I am still the same" responded the blondy boy  
" Do you think I'm still hiding things from you" she replied angrily.  
" I wish I could understand your sudden interest in looking for an apartment? You don't like my place?"

It was burnt out and it wasn't even Boze's fault, he certainly wouldn't have said anything about it.  
" Who said you could go through my computer?"  
" I've never gone through your computer because I respect you too much for that and you know it yourself, it's just a page that just opened up, it appeared when I wanted to turn it off"  
" Like magic, right?"

She had just taken her computer and opened it, Mac was absolutely right, a page had appeared right in the middle of the desktop.

He decided to walk away too angry to answer it, but he had heard something from the young woman that he didn't like.

Her face had turned scarlet, the anger was gradually rising in the young man.  
He turned around to face her again, she was responding to the real estate agent but had not seen him coming towards her.

" Is that what you really think? Who the hell do you think you are to bring this stuff out?"

She hadn't considered that he could hear the rest of the last sentence. She had just crossed the line she should never have crossed.  
Her heart was still pushing her to go further than anything, she didn't want to suffer as much as before, it was unbearable to see them constantly kissing each other at every turn where she was.

" And what do I really think in your opinion? That we're just colleagues and nothing more? Nothing ever happened between us"

She knew that words could hurt, Mac had taken so much more than anyone else in Phoenix. Jack who was nowhere to be found, the death of his father, his aunt Gwen whom he barely knew, and the death of Charlie, not to mention Desi.  
Riley was the reason Mac got up every morning but she had just stabbed him in the back.

She knew the words to use on the blond boy, it was the equivalent of an atomic bomb.

Mac felt her fingers sink into the palm of her hand and a few tears streamed down the corner of her eyes.  
It wasn't the first time she had said those few words to him, but they had hit him hard.

Riley decided to give him the coup de grâce.

" You know it's about time I moved and I'm right, it's been too long this story"  
His hand had become whiter than his own face, his cobalt blue eyes were darkened by all the anger he was releasing.

Riley knew he would be even angrier than he already was and hurt more than anything else.

" What do you know about that? Have you ever wondered how I feel? After all this, maybe you really mean it? But I never really did, I don't want you to move because you are more than that to me Riles"

" Stop calling me by that stupid nickname. It's not easy to know, Macgyver, you blow out the heat and then pretend I don't exist like you're afraid of something"

The blondie lowered her head and loosened her hand, her nails had gotten into her flesh because she had seen the marks on them.

He wasn't the kind of person to reveal himself so easily, Mac was compartmentalizing more than anything else.  
" I'm leaving," he said to the young woman.

He didn't want to justify himself more than anything else and especially in front of her, the blond boy turned one last time towards her when he was about to leave the war room.

" You're absolutely right Riley, we're just colleagues and nothing more, I never imagined that I would ever say that to your face "

The blond boy decided to leave for good, he closed the door behind him, a few tears had just fallen.  
She saw him leave here, the words she had spoken did not reflect how she felt about him, but she had to erect even more of a barrier so as not to crack even more.

Mac was much more to her than Riley wanted to admit.  
The young woman had settled back into the brown chair for a few moments, the screens were off, and the last technicians had just followed suit.

She was the only one left in Phoenix now.

To be continued...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you have enjoy this chapter !! May I asked to leave a kudos or a comment ?  
> Did you like it ?  
> It's my only retribution

**Author's Note:**

> Did you like it? You hated what I wrote ! Leave a kudos after all that and a comment, it always pleases the author


End file.
